"The trouble with a rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat" – Lily Tomlin

On Wants , Needs and Wishes

Most times I find myself thinking of living a better life. I mean who doesn’t?

I think of living in a bigger house, sleeping on a softer bed, waking up beside a super model who only breaths in oxygen for her nourishment. In this house would also be a pool, even though I can’t swim, two Alsatians and an Egyptian cat to keep my two dogs entertained. I’m all for animal cruelty within the lower ranks of the animal kingdom. No flames please 🙂

But what I want most of all is not to think about how long it would take me to satisfy these wants. The perfect situation.

My needs are simpler in nature however, as are all needs come to think of it, and cheaper to buy. But sometimes one doesn’t need any currency for the purchase. Needs tend to be of a basic nature. Something that you can’t live without or should be living with. Like water and food and clean air.

But in saying that I also see things like patience, mental fortitude, tolerance, sexual charisma (to quote the late Christopher Hitchens), and a general lack of negativity, as needs mainly because of their immediacy and accessibility. You just have to redirect electrical signals to their right addresses somewhere in that cranial dome of yours to unlock the door to personal growth.

Am I talking nonsense or are these qualities too trivial in nature to be called needs? No.

Does any one quality qualify as a need? Yes. Without the qualities I’ve just mentioned, which are in no way exhaustive, one’s quality of life becomes stunted. Running around with the impatience of a toddler for example would not get you very far. There is a great amount of truth to that old saying that good things come to those who wait.

Self improvement is a need. No two ways about it. Learning has made me a better person. More importantly learning from my mistakes has made me a smarter better person who would probably not be alive were it not for my refusal to accept myself, but rather improve on me.

But how does one then make strides in trying to change your general outlook on one’s life and that of others? How does one learn to be more patient with one’s self and others? How do you develop that sexual charm that most of us are not born with and find out the hard way with rejection after rejection? Does one go on and listen to that inner defeatist and just wish these things into one’s life but do nothing at all to get them because they might prove hard to master or do the complete opposite and take action.

Make that mountain come to you, minus the catastrophic earthquakes and destruction it would leave its wake.

But the hardest question of them all I find is how do I weave my wants, needs and wishes into this grand drive to self actualization without tripping over? What do I do in the attainment of my wants?

Aside the usual bloody-mindedness and hard work.

At least one thing I’ve managed to do is to not let my lack of imagination or cowardice affect the nature or scale of my wants. So if I want that $2 million mansion with the German guard dogs and an incessantly petrified pussy, I’ll want away. What I’ll do to get it and how ever long it will take is a secondary matter.